Moan is money

Name: Christian Gel.

Occupation: Complaigent

Hi, I'm Christian. Please, sit down. Can i get you anything? Tea, coffee, water? I've got still or sparkling, I find sparkling much more refreshing, and you can always add a lime for a bit of flavour. I hope this office isn't too hot for you. I spend half the year in Marbella so I have the rads on morning noon and night to keep me acclimatised. Is your recorder switched on there, 'cause I'm ready... to... roll.

What in the hell is a complaigent ?  Complaint Agent sounds too long, so i banged the two words together to make it more dynamic.  Believe you me, complaigent will eventually be  as common a job title as fireman, icecream man, auxiliary trapeze artist.

Now what I do here is I throw myself right into the middle of potential disputes between friendly parties and ensure that cordiality is maintained.

Say you have family X and family Y living side by side. It's the middle of Autumn and family X's majestic oak tree is shedding leaves by the bucketload. The Xs make no attempt to clean them up, and as a result, they become scattered over family Y's garden, to such an extent that young Master Y loses two frisbees and a porn magazine robbed from his dad under them. family X and family Y have had a great relationship over the years. Mrs. X was a great help to Mrs. Y when she had problems with her sinuses. The Ys don't want to damage this over some fallen detritus on their garden now, do they? Of course not.  So the Ys come to me, and I act as a medium for their views and feelings.  I'll sit down with the Ys and come up with a plan of action to suit them. This can range from a letter written by a fictional local resident, right up to a full blown smear campaign on all forms of social media.

I've gone to houses in the dead of night to slip notes in through the letterbox. "You would benefit from improved dental hygiene Maureen" was one, another memorable one was "While it's good to maintain a comprehensive exercise regime, you're packing too much muscle and my kids are having nightmares because they think you are The Terminator."

I thank Christian for his time, my first chance to speak since the interview started. 

Chris Feuermacher - Prehistoric Groom

Merry Chris mass(production)

Name: Breffni Hassett

Job: CEO, Chris O’ Dowd Toys.

Boyle ( Pronounced Boil) in Co. Roscommon, is well known because, according to Wikipedia, Brendan Gleeson has a holiday home there.

It is also the hometown of another actor, Chris O’ Dowd. You might recognise him  from popular sitcom The Computer Lads on channel 4,  but O’ Dowd was unleashed on a global audience last year off the back of the box office hit Father of the Bride 2. It’s this new found international fame that has spurred Breffni Hassett, a local businessman and childhood friend of O’ Dowd’s, on to his latest entrenpreneural endevour.

“I always knew that Chris would become a big star, he’d be the life of the classroom, always telling stories to make us all laugh,”  Breffni tells me over coffee in his office.  “When the school drama class would put on a musical every year, Chris would be the first person picked to star. He was a revelation in Grease, but mainly because he was the only thirteen year old in class who could grow sideburns.  If John Travolta had seen him as Danny Zuko, I tell ya, he’d have shat himself.”

Inspired by the endless merchandise associated with the Star Wars films, Breffni is determined to honour his old friend Chris in a commercially appropriate way, as he puts it. “Look it,  George Lucas is a genius. He got them to make a lollypop in the likeness of Jar Jar Binks’s tongue.  I’m not saying that there is any mass demand for a Chris O’ Dowd tongue lollypop, maybe there is.  A lot of perverts out there.   But Chris O’ Dowd matching coal bucket and shovel sets?  Now you’re talking. How about waking up in the morning with the sun shining through a pair of Chris O’ Dowd curtains? I have a thinktank of lads who spend 10 hours a day writing complicated marketing diagrams on a flipchart, thinking of new ways to explore the O’ Dowd goldmine.  ”

With that, Breffni holds up the crown jewel in his empire, the talking Chris O’ Dowd action figure.  I have to admit, it doesn’t look much like him.  In fact, there is more than a passing resemblance to...

“Patrick Bergin?”  Says Breffni, not the least bit surprised at the comparison.  “  I got these babies off the internet. Bergin’s version of Robin Hood didn’t do the business that Costner’s one did, possibly cause he didn’t play him as an American and there wasn’t a catchy song attached. These figures were gathering dust in a warehouse, so we got ‘em,  repackaged them, and gave them a voice.”  He passes me the figure, and urges me to pull the string on the figure’s back, which I do.  “Hi, I’m Chris O’ Dowd, let’s be friends and sing a song together” it tells me.  It sounds like an argument between a Drunken C3PO and a cash register.  This man’s gonna make a fortune.

From The Archives

My great, great grandfather,  Horace Boatfudge, was a prominent feature in Dublin society.  He wrote a weekly column for The Irish Times, called The Pertinent Gent.

February 4th 1904, The Boat Is Sinking Fast

I awake this morning with serious malady, dear readers. Head throbbing, as if someone was reenacting The Boer War in my temporal lobe.  I’d been invited to a soiree the previous evening at the Royal Zoological gardens, at the behest of my VBA* Sir Clement Fipplecroft.  Clement had recently taken delivery of a new pachyderm, a male called Gaja, and gathered the who’s who of Dublin society to celebrate.  I took an early tea in the Gresham with chums Belvedere “Belvo” Rockclimb And Richard “The Cooker” Cook.  The other members of the infamous Sackville Seven had cried off,  Edward Waltoncake by way of a telegram, citing an aggravation of his gout from a particularly truculent game of rugger the previous weekend.  Hipflasks filled, we made our way to a Hansom Cab for the long commute to the Phoenix park...

Halfway up the quays, the smell of hops from that place that brews that horrible black tonic of the working classes hits Belvo’s nose like a shot from a Webley & Scott and he turns green. He demands that the carriage come to an immediate halt, and flops out onto the street,  promptly depositing some partially digested roast beef and sherry all over his rather fetching new pair of boots and matching gaiters (4 and 6d from Mervyn’s of Berkeley road).  The carriage driver,  a rather stern chap of grimy facade, informed us that he would be most displeased to continue the transit with our under par companion, but on removal of my rather corpulent wallet from the breast pocket of my great coat (Brown Thomas, a steal at 11 pounds.), my offer of additional financial appeasement soon soothed his qualms.

            We alighted the carriage around nine, where Sir Clement had prepared a most lavish display in the rose garden behind Haughton House.  While Belvo and the Cooker took full advantage of the imbibations on offer, Clement insisted, absolutely insisted, that I go for a ride on Gaja.  I was more than happy to do so.  My former paramour, Evelyn Wanklefont, was also at the party, and I feared that in my intoxicated state, a lustful glance from Ms. Wanklefont would prompt a brief tryst by the Giraffe enclosure, and a self administered dose of penicillin come morningtime.  After being helped onto the elephant’s back, Sir Clement providing an accomodating but rather inappropriate push to my posterior, off I went for what I hoped would be a jolly jaunt around the grounds.

            Unfortunately, Gaja galloped off like a disobliging locomotive, and by the time the elephant had been sufficiently tranquillised by the zookeepers, he’d trampled all over the night’s merriment. Thankfully, none of the guests were harmed, though Belvo’s carelessly discarded hat (4 pounds from Taylor’s of Ely Place) was irretrievably mangled under Gaja’s considerable hindquarters.

The rest of the evening remains fuzzy as I lie in bed probing my pain addled brain, but i’m sure that a good evening’s sport was had by all.  The door to my adjacent water closet has just opened, and Evelyn appears, flushed of face and swathed in my burgundy robe.  I fear, dear readers, that I may need that penicillin after all.

                                                                                                                        HB

VBA – Very best Acquaintance

Myself, Sir Clement and assorted cohorts with Gaja the elephant.

Galaxy's quest

“Oh look at her there, swanning around in her lovely frock”

“Oh look at her there, swanning around in her lovely frock”

Name:  Darius Boots

Occupation: Senior Judge – Australia’s next top model.

I’m in a taxi on my way from the airport, bonded to my seat by the marriage of sweaty clothes and fake leather upholstery.  It’s so hot that small animals are in danger of combusting (particularly dehydrated ones, they wouldn’t have a prayer) , and the once freezing bottle of water is threatening to boil over in my hand. 

I’m here in Sydney, home to Australians and Irish people looking to piss away a year getting locked.  Australia’s Next Top Model has, much like it’s global siblings, become a phenomenon,  with throngs of young Aussie ladies lining up around the block for a chance to be ridiculed on TV by “experts”, who claim to know all about ‘fashion” . One such “expert” is Darius Boots.  Nicknamed “The Gold Duchess”, possibly because of his wealth, definitely because of his tiara, Boots holds the dreams of so many in his lovely soft hands.  I know that they’re soft cause I shake one when I meet him, during a break in filming on the Models set. We sit on folding chairs in the corner, while the crew bustle about. He removes his high heeled converse shoes, custom made, and folds his legs like a yoga ninja.   Dance music is played loudly over speakers, but still the hissing is audible.

            Hissing.  From the swans.  Australia’s Next Top Model has  gone “Avian Chic(k)”, a phrase that Darius coined himself in two hours.  Knowing that I am from Ireland, Boots tells me that Ireland’s recent economic woes became a major catalyst for the show’s new direction.

“Well , it’s like this mate, ever since your country’s gone in the financial dunny,  people have had to be careful with their money.  They’ve cut back on the luxurys, the second car, the skiing holidays, teeth bleaching, all that stuff.  They’ve also had to curb their grocery budget.  No more organic cornflakes, no more probiotic chocolate spread. And with loaves of bread, every slice counts.  So no one feeds bread to the swans anymore.  And Miss Swan, what can she do? She can’t go to a supermarket, she hasn’t got a credit card.  Emigration is the only way forward. So they come here, where there’s nice weather and loads of, you know, bread. “

Darius spends the next five minutes on the virtues of using swans as models, their “Poise”, “Elegance”, “Natural confidence in front of a camera” and ”big long bloody necks that look great with or without jewellery”.

“I mean, look at Saoirse over there, he says, pointing to a tall cygnet wearing a cowboy hat and a kimono.  “There’s no way anyone should be able to pull that look off, but she makes it...”  He pauses to drink from a bottle of Avian (Specially packaged bottles to tie in with the show). “…Work.  And it shouldn’t work.  American and Japanese cultures brought together in a way that economic rivalries could never allow.”

I ask Darius if there’s a negativity to using swans as models.

“Oh absolutely mate.  The biggest problems are with dress straps.  No bloody shoulders on swans is there?  You put a swan in a strappy dress, I guarantee it’ll come off on the catwalk, and before you know it, she’s trod on the edge of it and gone arse over beak in front of the judges.  We had to stop doing any live broadcasts cause of all the tumbles, that and the way that they tend to shit everywhere whether there’s a camera on or not.”

A floor manager sidles up to Darius, tapping his watch. 

“Sorry mate, we gotta get filming, nice to meet you.”

I have one more question for Darius, before he returns to the set.  I inquire about why his other arm is in a cast, suspended by a leather and diamante sling.

“Oh, that was from Grainne.  I commented that she needed to shed some excess feathers, and the bitch hit me with her wing.  Who knew that a swan could break your arm?”

Hmm.  Everyone knows that.

Pictured: Savannah takes offence when the photographer asks her to stop pouting

Ten People Who’ve Had Jobs

-JFK.

-The Pope.

-Packie Bonner.

-Santa.

-Bosco.

-One half of Jedward.

-The other half of Jedward.

-Optimus Prime’s yoga teacher (Really, I’m interviewing her shortly)

-That guy who Colin Firth played in that film.

-The milkman who delivered to the house that I grew up in.